The man with the silver cane

Last week, it was Valborg. There we were, entranced by the fire: faces toasty hot; backs chilly in the cold of the evening.

He was standing next to us: an old man with a face whose map showed each mountain range climbed, each river sailed upon and each new path explored. The wrinkles spoke of adventure and spirit as did his twinkling eyes.

His child-like spirit shone through, diminishing his age as gnarled hands rested on the silver-topped cane. The spellbound kids listened as he told us wild tales of how – back in the 1960s – he had stood on this same spot in a snowstorm, and with snow higher than the tops of his boots, as they lit the bonfire and sung songs about spring.

“It was a crazy year!” he declared laughing.

When I asked him if his cane was magic, he said that yes, it was. Inside the mundane exterior, he kept his magic wand. He didn’t use it every day, but took it out to spread magic around on special occasions.

I came to think of how this old man was just like his cane: an ordinary old man on the outside, with a heart of gold and wondrous tales to tell on the inside.

Magical yes — and I love when characters” share their stories. But I gotta’ tell you that the post has me looking to see how gnarled my hands are — since I was alive well and quite grown up already back there in the 60s! (I looked — they are kinda’ gnarly ;>)

Fabulous when you meet people like this. There is a nonagenarian in our village who lived all her life here. And boy was it tough. When I feel hard done by I take her some eggs and listen to her stories. A tiny, wizened, crone on the outside, but a fountain of inspiration within.